In the digital age, presenting can become a mass of data within a mass of slides. Indeed, the problem of lots of slides is made worse by the modern problem of lots of data. This worsening of presenting potential is damaging for the business aims of presenting. Presentation aims can range from decision making, to sharing knowledge so new meaning and ideas flourish, or presenting to communicate expertise, or performance KPIs.
Our QA point of view on presenting is it presenting style and content needs to be fit for the modern digital age. As customers become more demanding, environments more uncertain, ambiguous and complex, and organisations more agile and data driven to meet these demands, presentations need to reflect this high performing way of working.
Presentations need to tell a story; a story backed by data and insights drawn from the data. For agility to shine through, presentations need to integrate multiple perspectives. If the aim is decision making, the have all functional areas been represented and are insight combining data from those perspectives? If new meaning making is the aim, can all stakeholders access the language of the presentation? If communicating performance is the aim, are the performance figures understandable in terms of the broader organisational and sectoral context?
Often the emphasis of presenting courses can be confidence and style of the presenter. Whilst a worthy case and included in this course, we have a dual focus on presenter and business value of the presentation. Asking learners to track their presenting back to business value allows the presentation to be refined and gives the presenter the confidence to present. If an audit trail of data to insights to recommendations can be developed … or an audit trail from technical language to business language to performance can be developed… or SME expertise to new and developing ideas can be developed that are customer centric – then you have a presentation that has impact. It has impact because the value to the organisation is clear.
Presenting with impact is about communicating to drive value. It is focused on context by providing the opportunity to present a business agenda with feedback from peers and the facilitator, and to present again, demonstrating the improvement in communicating the business aim and value.
By combining the organisational value of presenting, with the personal capability to present, creates double value if not more. Seeing the presentations of others gives peers ideas about what they can do and why they might not present in the same way as others. Even presenting has its own organisational context.
Presenters and presentations gain clarity and clarity means higher performance. Discussion between presenter and audience is helped by the story being able to reveal the trail from original thinking to conclusions and from conclusions to organisational value add.
Our approach is very targeted. We look at specific and modern challenges around the value of presenting in the digital age and how therefore to develop presentation skills. Presenting delves deep as you need to do the homework behind what it is your presenting.
Is the presenter a deep SME presenting the value of your expertise to others as you need their collaboration to bring value?
Is the presenter a cross functional influencer seeking to bring perspectives together to make an agile decision that can be implemented?
Is the presenter communicating to an audience to motivate and inform - to encourage and provoke high performance?
By making value central the learning, learning from others is not passive. Each presentation is a hunt for clear value trails to the organisational agenda. Presenting is costly to an organisation as it involves many taking time out to listen and not be distracted.
Our approach clearly directs the learner to ways of presenting that are appropriate for their context, and role, and which are linked to performance. We provide a safe place to explore the emotions of presenting irrespective of role, experience, and seniority. Returning to work energised with focus on the value of presenting ensures greater preparation.
Included are sessions that clearly articulate how the learning can be translated into different presenting contexts with different value add. There is psychological safety in working hard on ensuring presenting adds value to the organisation and how in turn value drive presenting improves the personal brand of the learner. Those confident in presenting are noticed in organisations as it involves a combination of many durable skills and business acumen. The course is a way of recognising the staff whose potential might well to date have been hidden behind poor presenting skills.
As well as the opportunity to practise and gain feedback, we keep the focus on robust action planning for post workshop activities. The experience is relevant, useful, enjoyable, and stretching in all the right ways. The course takes learners past just ‘good’ presenting into a growth zone that’s right for each learner. Basics are covered plus evolving challenges, trends and new tech to take presentations front and centre of winning in the digital age.
Our learning is geared towards people who lack confidence in presenting to have impact – whether they need a renewed focus on presenting as data has become self-service or more readily available, or because they are relatively new to presenting, or a bad presentation has knocked their confidence.
There are no pre learning or pre-requisites. Learners are purely asked to come with their limited experience, and their understanding of their unique context to share with others in terms of the value of presenting within their role and career development.
Throughout learners are asked to complete a QA Leveraging Learning Log (LLL) so that learning is translated into relevant opportunities for growth – personal and organisational. Unique to QA, the LLL is a key part of our teaching and learning strategy that ensures learning flows back into the workplace with effort of course, but without wasted or un-co-ordinated effort.
The course takes a view of presenting that is value driven. The course includes, by way of example of topics covered:
We look forward to running these events to make a difference to the learner and their organisation.
Join our public courses in our South Africa facilities. Private class trainings will be organized at the location of your preference, according to your schedule.